True Story: Pt. 1

"Oh my God, this is boring," he thought as he looked over the pool. Being a lifeguard was kind of a raw deal. It's the only job where everyone is happy if you described your day as 'boring,' unless you happened to actually be the lifeguard. But even then, you can't really be upset that your day at work wasn't that exciting. If you are, then being a hit-man is probably a better career choice for you.

He looked over the pool once more. No one seemed to be drowning- which was good, but boring. To entertain himself, he began to twirl his whistle around his finger. It wrapped around roughly five times before he had to swing the other way. Then it wrapped around about ten times, unwrapping for five and re-wrapping for five more. He added another finger for the whistle to wrap around as he twirled it back in the original direction. It made a full seven revolutions. Back the other way, however, it only made six. "That's odd," he thought listlessly and tried it again. He kept at it mindlessly, adding and subtracting fingers at random. Sometimes he would twirl it quickly, and sometimes he would see how slowly the whistle could go. This was his fourth straight hour of sitting up on the stand, watching over the pool. This was also the most fun he had had since those four hours started.

He twirled his whistle.

He twirled it some more.

He scanned the pool.

He twirled and scanned at the same time.

He was getting quite good at this.

In fact, he was getting so good at it that he suddenly found himself with an audience. Just as he was about to attempt what he would later call a "triple twist, half-inverted twirl-pike," he looked down and saw two young girls watching him. They seemed to be about eleven or twelve years old. They also seemed to be very interested in his whistle's acrobatics. Slightly embarrassed, he scrapped his attempt at the "Triple twist, Half-Inverted Twirl-Pike" and settled with regular twirling. The two girls' interest didn't wane in the slightest bit. They continued looking at the whistle eagerly. They were captivated by every cycle, delighted with every change in rotation.

"That's odd," he thought, again. Ideally, this is not a statement one wants to hear a lifeguard say. But under these circumstances, things were indeed quite odd.

There was something strange about these two girls, but he just couldn't figure out what. The long hours of watching the pool without a break had dulled his mind, and although he could feel that he was on the verge of grasping what it was, he had a hard time thinking. He continued scanning and twirling. The girls continued watching.

As his eyes made their way back to the girls again, he noticed a bit of dirt on one of their arms. He watched for a second, wondering if she knew. In that moment, the girl took a break from watching his whistle and looked down at her arm. She saw the dirt, decided to remove it, and licked herself clean. "That was very odd," he thought, blandly.

He could still feel that unrealized thought in the back of his mind. It was getting closer and closer to coming out. It had something to do with those two girls. They were still watching his whistle. It had to have been for at least five minutes now. It didn't really bother him, though; it felt like this was what they should be doing.

His gaze fell upon the girls again. As he looked at them this time, he noticed that the delight had left the girls' faces and been replaced by very intense concentration. He looked for another second. That second turned into five more seconds, which then grew up into a full fifteen seconds. They hadn't blinked once. Their eyes were too busy following the whistle. What really demanded his attention, though, was the fact that their pupils were now enormous. As they concentrated on the twirling whistle, their pupils grew larger. They looked to be about the size of dimes. "That's odd," he noted, only a little fazed. His mind was too numb to be properly fazed by this or the fact that the last time any lifeguard noticed three very odd things in one shift, the pool she worked for was shut down.

He continued scanning the pool and allowed his brain to continue to work out just what it was that made those girls so odd. It was on the tip of his tongue, but he just couldn't put the words to it. It was so close that it was very frustrating. He twirled his whistle angrily.

His scanning pattern crossed the girls again. They hadn't moved an inch, but their ears perked up as his eyes landed directly on them. "What a weird thing for girl's ears to do," he registered.

"What is my brain trying to tell me?" he wondered. He could almost taste it now. It was itching terribly to come forward. Any second now and he would either consciously know or consciously explode. It was so close.

The whistle twirled faster; the girls became tenser.

"These girls are like-" he began. It was finally being revealed. The moment had arrived. "These girls are like-"
He interrupted himself again. "Wait, were these girls always this hairy?"

They were indeed hairy, but they hadn't always been. They now had a nice coat of hair covering most of their bodies. It was very odd.

It all came together right then. His mind surged; everything fell into place. "These girls are like cats!" he exclaimed internally.

The very instant he finally realized this, the girls finished their transformation into cats. They proceeded to pounce on the whistle in the very next instant, biting and scratching him badly while doing so. Two instants later, they had clawed the whistle out of his grasp and ran off with it.

The swimmers in the pool kept swimming. No one had seemed to notice. He continued scanning the pool. His skull was clouded with smoke. His brain had worked so hard to make the previous connection that it couldn't handle what had just happened. At least not now. All he could manage to do was create one final thought before his brain sizzled: "That was odd." His brain burned out, completely fried. Luckily, he didn't need much brainpower to guard effectively. It was a very boring shift.